


And makes me end where I begun

by ambiguously



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, May the 4th Treat, Multi, Polyamory, Rescue Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-05-01 12:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14520195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambiguously/pseuds/ambiguously
Summary: Luke is missing. Leia and Han go looking for him.





	And makes me end where I begun

**Author's Note:**

  * For [liz_mo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/liz_mo/gifts).



> Spoilers from TLJ but AU from the sequels

Luke was missing.

Ben had contacted Han, frantic and horrified. Someone or something had infiltrated the school through the students themselves. Half a dozen had turned on the rest. Ben had managed to get a handful away to safety, but he'd been forced to leave his uncle behind.

"I shouldn't have left. I should have stayed and fought," he said. There was more. Han didn't have to understand the weird Jedi stuff to tell when Ben was keeping something back.

"It's going to be all right," he said. "You saved as many as you could."

"I should have stayed with Uncle Luke." He'd gone back, he'd told Han, once the others were hidden away. He'd found bodies, none of them belonging to Luke.

"You feel he's alive. So does your mom. We'll find him. In the meantime, find somewhere safe. Until Luke gets back, you're going to have to be in charge."

A new horror crept over his son's face. "I can't teach them. I don't know enough."

"Then make something up. Your uncle was making up half of it as he went along anyway."

When the transmission ended, Han found Leia sitting in their bunk, her eyes closed. Without disturbing her, he sat down next to her and waited. Long minutes passed. Leia didn't have much training with the Jedi stuff, far less then Ben did, but from the day they'd met, Leia had always had a connection with her brother. Now it was their one chance to find him.

She opened her eyes. "I can't get a location. He's alive. He's grieving. That's all I know for sure."

Han took her hand. "Can you tell if he's a prisoner?"

"I think so. That would be why he doesn't want to tell me where he is. He'll be worried we're going to make some hopeless dash to come to his rescue." She looked at Han. Han didn't have to read her mind to know that's precisely what she planned.

**

Using the Force as a compass was a terrible idea. Leia knew it, and she knew the few other Force-wielders she'd known would tell her this was a bad plan, even if they'd all done the same thing themselves. But Luke was missing, and as much as he tried to hide himself away from her, she knew he was in pain.

Han flew the ship in small jumps, waiting for Leia at the end of each one to recalibrate her mind to Luke's whereabouts. It took them days. Leia slept only in fits while they were in hyperspace, hating even that short time away from finding Luke. Han held her, and petted her hair, and she felt his own worries, silent, as the time passed and they still hadn't located where Luke had been taken. He must have been aboard a ship, she thought, and he kept moving.

So did they.

**

Twelve days after his capture, Luke awoke in his cell. He'd spent the days in isolation, food arriving by slot and delivered by an unseen hand. His captors feared him, for all that they had managed to subdue him. His own pupils, led adrift by a darkness he hadn't sensed in time. Luke had seen the clawed fingers digging in the hearts of all his students. Most had shivered in the night in dark dreams they forgot, but the malevolent spirit had turned some of his brightest students, and nearly turned the student he loved like his own son.

Ben was safe. Some of the other students were safe. Luke couldn't ask for more now.

Upon their arrival to their destination, Luke would be brought before the monster who'd destroyed his school from within, and there was little chance he would survive the encounter. With some luck, neither would the monster.

He felt Leia brush his mind. She'd been calling for him since his capture. He hadn't made contact back with her, fearing the dark force who'd wrought this would not pass up the offer to collect her, too.

The door to his cell opened.

Luke readied himself. He still cared for the pupils who'd betrayed him. He could incapacitate at best. He wouldn't kill them.

He tensed his body to fight. Then Leia hurried in. She'd disguised herself in the Force the same way he had, he saw, noticing this idly as he flew to his feet and embraced her. "You shouldn't have come."

"You knew we would. Come on." She led him out of the cell. At the end of the corridor, Han stood beside two crumpled but breathing forms.

"You never taught them to dodge stun blasts?"

"This is not the time to critique my teaching strategy," Luke said, hugging him. "Thank you. Thank you both."

Leia said, "All we need now is a garbage chute."

Han holstered his blaster then grabbed each of them with a hand. "Let's not."

Luke remembered the exhilaration of running from danger. For a while, the thrill and the joy of seeing Han and Leia dampened his other sorrows. Leia stunned another one of his captors, but not before the alarm sounded. Now it was a real chase, their heels pelting the deck as they ran for the airlock Han had attached to unseen against the hull.

The umbilical broke away with the three of them safely aboard the Falcon. Moments later, they soared away into hyperspace. Leia took her seat beside Han. Luke sat behind him, hand comfortable on Han's shoulder.

Leia said, "That may be the best rescue we ever had."

"Nah," Han said. "Everyone survives my rescue attempts most of the time. How many do you owe me now?"

"I forget," said Luke. "Are we subtracting from the ones you owe me? I'll have to come up with some way to repay you." He met Han's twinkling smile. They could joke about payment, but they both knew that in a little while, the three of them would climb into their bunk and reassure one another that they were all safe and whole, probably for hours.

Leia raised Ben on the comm and told him the good news. Luke sighed and leaned back in his seat. There would be time to mourn the dead later. For now, he was in the company of the two people he loved more than anyone else in the galaxy.


End file.
